Cooler weather has calmed the Pomas Fire as additional protections are put in place

Aerial view of Pomas Fire, July 20. Helicopters are dropping water buckets on hot spots.

Firefighters remain at work in difficult steep, rugged terrain in the Glacier Peaks Wilderness, northwest of Entiat. The Incident Command on the Pomas fire offered an update on their continued work at a community meeting at the Entiat Fire Station Monday night.

"It's just not effective to go direct anymore," Operations Chief Aaron Rowe said while displaying a map of the fire. "We've come up with some different strategies if that fire wants to move out of its current footprint. There are areas of barriers, big rocks, big mountains, big things that aren't going to burn. But there are a couple of places where it could get through these rocks, trees, and one of them is Pomas Pass."

"Right now it's not really moving much, the rain kinda helped it stay in its place," added Rowe.

The Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest reported Monday that three heavy helicopters dropped around 75,000 gallons of water on hotspots in the Pomas and Ice Creek drainages. Sawyers cleared a helicopter landing site while working near Domke Lake that can be used for shuttling firefighters, supplies, or emergency extraction.

Firefighters assessed additional structures to the southeast of the fire and are developing a structure protection plan in that area. On the Chiwawa River Road, heavy equipment task forces are moving north and south from Rock Creek preparing the secondary (fire protection) line along the road while crews are felling snags and removing brush on the steeper slopes that are inaccessible to machinery. Additional heavy equipment and crews continue to work on secondary firelines clearing snags and removing brush along the Chikamin and Entiat River Roads.

The National Forest has an expanded closure order due to heavy equipment working on secondary line construction along Chiwawa Road, in the interest of firefighter and public safety. The fire remains 12 air miles from the Pacific Crest Trail and currently poses no threat to that trail. There is a Temporary Flight Restriction (TFR) in place over the fire. Unauthorized drone activity is prohibited under the TFR, as helicopters and aircraft cannot fly when drones are present.